A Comparative Assessment of Forest/green Cover and the Awareness of Forestry District Managers

Abstract

Forests in and around the cities are becoming crucial in climate adaptation as the severity and frequency of heat waves, and urban heat islands are estimated to increase in the coming decades. As the local forestry authority, the forest district manager's role in establishing and managing forested green spaces in and around the cities is essential. The study is based on a land cover analysis, in selected provinces of Türkiye, for a period of three decades. We compared the responses of district forest managers to understand their awareness and perception of urban green areas and related climate change issues. The survey was sent to all district forest managers of the State Forest Service (GDF) and responded to by 69 from 28 provinces. The major land cover maps used were explicitly developed for land cover analysis by the GDF with temporal points of 1990, 2000, and 2015. To calculate the urban forest cover in the city centers, we used the city limit delineation shapefiles produced by the EU Copernicus program. We also employed the land consumption rate/population growth rate metric to reveal and discuss the provinces' land and forest cover changes. The results showed that forest district managers were aware of the general condition of the forests in their provinces. Still, there was a considerable inconsistency between actual land use changes (i.e., deforestation) and their responses. The study also revealed that the forest managers were aware of the increasing influence of climate change issues but were not knowledgeable enough to establish the connection between their tasks and climate change. It has been concluded that the national forestry policy should prioritize the urban-forest interaction and develop the capacities of district forest managers to improve the efficiency of climate policies on a regional scale.